•••

"What's the wall for?" Xander asked, peering over the low stone structure. The sands were cooler here, so his shoes were simply gummy and not melted. On the far side of the wall was the river of blood, swirling and steaming.

"Well, nobody down here wants to give these people any relief," Doyle replied, gesturing towards the next group of tortured spirits. They were stumbling and loping across the sand, their hands raised to shield their faces from raining, fiery hail. Whenever two of these people encountered each other, they raked their hands down, tearing huge strips of flesh from their naked bodies. They consumed the torn flesh, gore and spittle covering them from nose to knee. The molten rain seemed to pour down harder on these most vicious ones, burning them to a crisp.

"I take it these guys are worse than blasphemers?" Spike asked quietly, making sure that the umbrella completely covered all three of them. "Although the last bit was pretty bad."

Doyle nodded, his frown severe. "Oh, they're much worse. These are the incestuous; those parents who would force themselves upon their innocent children." He grimaced as one figure lifted a handful of sand to his mouth, shoving the dusty material into his mouth.

Spike watched the people with no trace of pity in his eyes. This act was one he, even at his most depraved, could not condone. Children, particularly young ones, trusted their parents with absolute faith. The destruction of that by such repugnant means was worth ten thousand times this torture.

"A long time ago," Doyle continued as he began to walk again, "These people were housed lower, with others who betrayed their kin."

"Why were they moved up?" Spike asked harshly. He couldn't imagine any reason for letting them off lightly.

Doyle's smile was malicious. "Those who made this place decided that such parents deserved a more... active form of torture, something that burned hot instead of cold."

Spike nodded in understanding. From what he'd seen, going deeper and deeper into Tartarus didn't always make the tortures progressively worse, just... more interesting. They'd passed several rent, screaming figures when the vampire noticed that Xander was following along silently, not entertaining them with his usual banter. "Xander?" He called out.

Xander came up to stand next to Spike. "Hmm?"

"You're quiet," The blonde murmured.

"I'm kinda tired," The young man admitted. "How much farther do we have in this part?" He asked Doyle. "And is there any place we can take a nap?"

Doyle studied the young man carefully. "You really don't want to sleep around here, Xander. Purgatory shouldn't be as bad, though."

"Oh, ok," Xander mumbled. He fell back behind Spike as they shuffled through the sand, avoiding tiny bits of flamey flesh that littered the ground.

One particularly nasty individual caught Spike's eye and he stopped walking. "Hey, Doyle?"

"Yeah?" Doyle said. "What is it?"

"That guy, he's only half there," Spike replied, pointing. "And he's getting ripped to shreds." Indeed, the man's back was little more than a bloody gob of bones and flesh. Fire sizzled as it hit, and dark blotches of sand rubbed into each wound.

Doyle shuddered convulsively. "That's because he's still alive," The ghost responded. "Whatever he did was bad enough to earn a reservation ahead of time." Indeed, even the other damned seemed to target the shade, each one removing a huge handful of skin and muscle as they walked past.

"Er..." Xander mumbled. "That's gross. Can we... you know, get the fuck out of here?"

Spike and Doyle traded a quick glance, but acceded to Xander's wishes. They walked faster, moving aside to skirt the not-quite-dead-yet man next to them. Unfortunately, their passage did not go unnoticed.

"You!"

The three men stopped and turned as one. It was only by the grace of Spike's quick reflexes that he managed to catch Xander before he fell to the ground.

"Dad."